


but the lion has nothing to fear

by mockyrfears



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post-War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-21
Updated: 2012-03-21
Packaged: 2017-11-02 08:09:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/366853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mockyrfears/pseuds/mockyrfears
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jaime Lannister awaits the Dragon Queen's judgement in the Black Cells. Set after the war but spoilers for post-AFFC just to be safe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	but the lion has nothing to fear

It was not the first time Jaime found himself thinking of his brother. There was fearful little else to do in the cloying darkness. He wondered once again if this was the same black cell Tyrion had been placed in by the hands of his sister, the same cell he broke into and saved his brother from. “A kindness I never did,” Jaime lamented ruefully. To what end? Tyrion had repaid him in turn by murdering their father that very same night. No matter which way Jaime turned, he seemed to be stumbling further into the darkness.

“And now you sit with the bastard king and the dragon queen, dear brother,” He had learned from his stint in Riverrun that talking to oneself kept your wits about you. “And condemn me to death,”

The wooden door of his cell rattled.

_Have I finally gone mad?_  Jaime pressed himself against the wall behind him, glaring suspiciously into the darkness at where the noise had come from.  _No_. The door thumped again. Someone was there, for certain.  _So they’ve finally come to judge me for all my crimes. Let them. I have nothing to fear._  He tried to stand, so he could meet his justice face to face and look them in the eye, but his legs were too weak from disuse. He wondered who it would be. His old friend Ser Ilyn was dead; perhaps it would be one of those Dothraki savages, or a Northman. Hells, not one of those terrible  _eunuchs_  that struck more unrest in him than any Faceless Man ever could.

The door swung open, and Jaime’s stump instinctively flew up to his face, a futile attempt to try and shield his eyes from the sudden light as a torch was thrust into the dark. The flames flickered and snapped before him, blinding him and filling the dank cell with a warmth it had sorely lacked. He struggled to adjust to the light, and it soon became clear the torchbearer was a woman.  _Impossible._

“Cersei?”  _I have died,_  he supposed, it was the only explanation.  _I rotted in that cell and so my sister has come to guide me through the seven hells_.

“No,” The figure moved closer. Her face seemed to change with each flicker of the torch’s flames, dancing behind the shadows. Jaime squinted up at her as she drew nearer, none the wiser until she was practically towering over him so that he had to crane his neck upwards. A chill passed through him then. _It cannot be. I am dead, she is a ghost and she has come to mock me_. For Catelyn Stark was dead, yet it seemed all of a sudden as if he had flown through time, back to when his sister and his children and his  _family_  still lived, in Riverrun’s prisons with Lady Stark. He found himself looking behind her for any sign of Brienne. Yet when his eyes returned to the woman before him, he realised that he was wrong. This mystery woman was far taller than Lady Stark had been, younger and much more beautiful besides. She knelt in front of him, uncaring for the state of his cell floor, and offered him a flagon of liquid.

“Drink something. It’s just water but I thought you might be thirsty,”

Her face came into focus. He couldn’t have been more surprised if it had been Aerys himself.

“Lady Sansa?”

“You have not lost your wits, Ser. Now try something to drink,”

Jaime was too parched to care about making any smart remarks and accepted the flagon with his left hand clumsily, gulping hungrily from it. When he felt as though he might retch if he drank any more, he set it aside and peered at the girl before him .The years had been kind to the pretty young girl he remembered from Winterfell. She was a woman grown now, far more beautiful than even his sister had ever been. Her auburn hair seemed to glow in the torchlight, and she smiled shyly under his scrutiny.

“Lady Stark,” he managed to rasp. “I fear I am not fit you to receive you,” This was all too eerily reminiscent of Lady Catelyn’s visit unto him all those years ago. If only the water was wine on this occasion. “I had not expected any visitors. Pray tell, to what do I owe the honour?”

Sansa studied him for a moment before replying.

“The commons are clamouring for your head. The Queen is having her dragons melt down your armour in order to forge a magnificent golden sword, with which she plans to strike off your head,” Her expression never changed. “She says your blood will mark your house colours,”

Jaime grimaced. “Dare I ask for what crime?”

“Being a Lannister, of course,”

He smiled ruefully in spite of himself. He had suspected as much, since the day they had thrown him in the Black Cells. The common people had wasted little time unfurling their dragon banners the moment the Targaryen girl’s dragons had appeared in Westeros and melted away the ghastly Others. They had been deprived the glory of witnessing the death of Cersei and her children, no doubt they were clamouring to see at least _one_  Lannister die. He tried not to think of his twin – a stark contrast to his last time in a prison cell, where memories of her had kept him alive. Now, when he closed his eyes and tried to remember her, all he saw was her in her final moments, her hands clawing her own face. He took another drink.

“I take it they didn’t see Cersei’s death as a gesture of my goodwill?” He had not wanted to kill her, truly. ‘ _The things I do for love_ ,’ he had whispered, drawing his dagger across his sister’s neck. Watching her children die had driven her mad.  _Remember Rhaegar’s children_ , he had thought,  _remember Elia Martell_. His sister would suffer no rapes or further humiliations, he had seen to that. When he’d drawn his blade, he saw in Cersei’s eyes the first coherent emotion he had seen in a long time – gratitude.

“No one is accursed as the Kinslayer,”

All this chitchat didn’t seem to be going anywhere.

“I confess, Lady Sansa, I am not sure why you have decided to visit my humble cell. I have not seen you since all those years ago in Winterfell. What could you possibly want from me?”

Sansa stood then, so Jaime had to crane his neck upwards to look at her.

“Tell me, Ser Jaime,” she said softly, barely more than a whisper. “Do you want to die?”

He blinked, taken aback. He found himself remarkably lost for words. Once he had laughed in Catelyn Stark’s face, that she had thought him afraid of death. But now...he did not fear, but what had he to live for? His sister was dead, his father was dead, his children... Only his brother now lived, and he would kill him on sight – he had vowed as much to him, back in these Black Cells so long ago.

“I always thought I’d die with a sword in my hand,” he admitted. “Now I don’t even have a hand in which to wield it. My house is in ruin, and my family is dead. Tell me, Lady Sansa, what is the purpose in such a life?”

He thought he glimpsed a sad smile grace her face in the flickering torchlight, but he could not be sure.

“A life that I have lived,” she replied simply. He studied her.

“You still haven’t answered my question. Why have you come?”

“I fear I know what it means to punished, simply for the crime of your birth,”

“Joffrey?”

“Joffrey,” Sansa confirmed. He had thought as much. He had been told all about Joff’s idea of justice. He was filled suddenly with a queer feeling of  _admiration_  for the woman before him. Here she stood, having lived through the ruin of her house, witnessing the death of her family, countless betrayals, and beatings from the hands of grown men on the orders of a mad boy king... He felt oddly humbled. _And I ask her what is there to live for... Gods, she’s lived it a million times over._ Jaime finally understood. His legs trembled as he pushed himself back against the wall and forced himself into a standing position, but he ignored them.  _If a girl of sixteen can be this strong, then what does that make me?_ Standing, he realised she was nearly of height with him.

“I did not think you would be the one to come and liberate me,”

“I did not think to be here,” she admitted, that shy smile playing on her face again. “Yet... Of all those who treated me cruelly, you were not one of them. You wanted to help me. To get me somewhere safe. Perhaps now I can return the favour,”

Jaime pushed himself away from the wall, and trembled unsteadily on his feet. Sansa swept in deftly, wrapping an arm around his right side and supporting his weight with strength surprising in a girl so slight. Holding the torch in her other hand, she helped him hobble from his cell.  _Gods, look at me_ , he mused to himself. _I thought I would never lean on any one but Cersei._ A sudden burst of laughter sent him stumbling, and crashing to the ground. Sansa was beside him at once, helping him back to his feet.

“And what should I do, Lady Sansa,” he chuckled, as she helped the wavering cripple from the rotted floor, “with this new leash of life you have given me?”

“Live,” Sansa whispered, her hand brushing gently against his cheek. “As I have,”


End file.
